


Golden Repair

by ambiguously



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Extra Treat, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Mildly Dubious Consent, Post-Order 66, Sex Pollen, You and me against the world
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-01
Updated: 2018-12-01
Packaged: 2019-08-26 17:16:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16685785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambiguously/pseuds/ambiguously
Summary: Everything has gone to hell. Depa and her Padawan have barely escaped with their lives, and now they are branded as traitors along with the rest of the Jedi. The only two things she knows for certain are that her old master and best friend is still alive, and that she needs to find him.





	Golden Repair

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thedevilchicken](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/gifts).



Her first awareness was of pain. Depa swam back to the surface of consciousness, her memories all jumbled. She'd been bitten by an akk-dog. No, she'd been attacked by Kar Vastor, piercing her with his vibroshield.

No.

She'd been shot.

She woke, eyes focusing dimly. A form moved over her. Another threat? The image resolved into Caleb, wide-eyed and terrified. She went to ask him what had happened, although now her memories were lining up in a row: her men by the fire, clones she'd fought with and served with, the few who'd survived the disaster at Haruun Kal, soldiers she'd bound herself to with blood and loyalty. They'd turned. They'd attacked her. Grey. Styles. "No," she whispered, and Caleb's hands covered her mouth.

Silence. Every motion told her they must stay silent. She lay in a tuffet of dead grass and leaves. Her ears pricked to hear the tromp of the clones' boots. Stay silent and live a little longer, despite the pain. She nodded once, and he crouched down beside her, throwing more leaves over them both. She didn't dare prod her own injury to check if she was burnt or bleeding, if the wound was mortal.

Depa drifted in and out of consciousness, the cold ground seeping into her body. She had nearly died on Haruun Kal. She had nearly died countless times. Now all that remained between her and the Force was the body heat from the trembling boy at her side.

She reached out with her mind, past Caleb, past the stars, greedy for comfort and sorrowful in her pain. Death didn't frighten her. Dying without meaning did. She stretched out her powers, seeking out the mind of her closest friend, the one person in all the galaxy who understood every fear she'd ever faced, who could sense her across star systems and offer surcease of the heart if nothing more.

Mace's mind reached out to hers, and he was filled with pain of his own.

Gradually, the noises faded. The clones would keep searching for them. "We must go now," she said. "They'll come back."

"Can you walk?"

The answer was unclear, but if she couldn't, he would stay and they'd both be slaughtered. Depa could recall too many times when her Master had to pull her out of danger. After any number of scrapes, Mace reminded her that when he'd agreed to become her teacher, he'd made a promise to watch out for her no matter what. She would honor that promise now.

"I can try."

They made their slow way into Plateau City. Depa's injury hindered them, the blaster bolt to the side scorching her robes and the skin beneath. A medical facility was out of the question. Jedi didn't steal, but sometimes they took and left a few credits Depa had in her pocket in their place. They hid in the alleys, dodging from shadow to shadow, away from the troopers showing their images to strangers and asking if they'd been seen. They exchanged their robes for whatever they could find, stealing like common thieves.

"Don't use this as a life lesson, Caleb," she warned him. "Jedi don't steal."

"Yes, Master Billaba."

Her holocron, the one she'd given him to study, came alive with a message. All Jedi were to return to Coruscant at once. Caleb smiled in relief. "That's good. They've sorted out the mistake. We can go home now."

Depa watched the hologram intently. "Something's wrong. I don't trust the message." She reached out with her mind again, but Mace had no answers for her. He was alive. She could feel their connection in the Force. He was on Coruscant. "But yes, we will return home."

They stowed away on a tramp freighter, and another, traveling the slow way from Kaller to the Core. Depa rested, urging her body to heal. Food was scarce. She encouraged Caleb to meditate instead of focusing on the pangs in his stomach. Soon, they would be home and everything would be better.

Midway through their journey, the message changed. Obi-Wan warned them to stay far from Coruscant, told them to trust in the Force. "Another trick?" Caleb asked, hopes fading.

Depa shook her head. "Not this time."

"We shouldn't go on to Coruscant. Master Obi-Wan said to stay away."

"So he did." Obi-Wan had been her friend for a long time. It did her heart well to know he still lived. Obi-Wan wasn't her primary concern now. "I am going to Coruscant. There are things I must do. You don't have to come with me." He didn't reply. He had nowhere else to go but with her. She remembered that from her Padawan days, too.

The little news that reached them painted a horrific picture: the Republic was no more, and the Jedi had been declared enemies of the new Empire. All Jedi were to be arrested if possible and terminated if not.

All arriving and departing ships were searched, even ships carrying vagrant workers and refugees. They used their lightsabers to cut a hole in the hull of the ship, creeping out like mice far from prying eyes with datapads and blasters. They'd be marked as soon as the vandalism was discovered. "Hurry," she told Caleb, even though she was the slower one.

All along their winding journey towards the Core, she'd kept hold of one golden tendril. The gossamer line grew stronger as they made their way into the dark levels under the main city. Criminals and worse lived down here, and clone troopers came to check identity chips, searching for hidden Jedi. They stayed to the shadows as they had on Kaller, talking to no one. When one unlucky thief attempted to rob them, he found himself robbed instead, and that gave them credits for food.

As Caleb devoured his first meal in days, he said around a mouthful, "Not a life lesson, right, Master?"

"Right."

It took her three days. What had been a beacon across the galaxy was a muddle here, but she found him at last in a surgeon's grimy bed. Even the poorest citizens of the Republic could use medical droids, but the outlaws and the desperate turned to organics. The doctor who'd worked on Mace's broken bones and sealed his poor cut wrist could not even afford a bacta tank, leaving his patients to heal or not on their own.

"Where was he found?" she asked after she sent Caleb back to their last hiding hole to wait.

"Above."

"Who brought him in?"

"Do you always ask so many questions?"

Depa bowed an apology and took a seat by Mace's bedside. He didn't wake, didn't stir, caught up in a fever and aware that he would waken to a nightmare. "I'm here," she said, resting her hand on his head, mindful of the new scars.

Inside his mind, she felt his presence simmering in a deep sorrow. She'd felt this before, touching her mind as she floated in her own recovery chamber, after. He'd gone to Haruun Kal to save her, had watched her teeter at the edge of a fall into darkness, and he'd visited her during her long coma, full of grief and self-blame. Now there was another fallen friend, not to death but to the Dark Side. She knew the truth if not the name. Mace carried the weight of the loss on his soul, as he'd carried hers.

Depa bent down to whisper into his ear. "Come now, old friend. Not everything that happens is your fault. It pains me to tell you this, but you're simply not that important."

Mace's eyes cracked open, blinking unhappily against even this dim light. "You would think so." He coughed, and she brought him some water. Now that he was awake, the surgeon would want payment, and he would want the bed free. "You shouldn't have come back. Coruscant isn't safe."

"What happened?"

He told her, words hardly above a whisper. The Chancellor was a Sith, and he'd murdered three good people before Mace had fought him to a standstill. Then Skywalker had come. As he spoke, his eyes went to the stump of his arm. Depa took his other hand and held it.

"Obi-Wan is still alive, or he was when he sent out his call. I don't know where he's gone. More reports come every day. They are tracking down survivors. Caleb and I have been very lucky, but I don't imagine that luck will hold."

"You should have taken him into hiding."

"I needed to find you." She squeezed his hand. "You'd have come for me if the situation were reversed. In fact, you have more than once. Don't argue now about what you taught me."

The doctor accepted the last of Depa's stolen credits to forget he ever saw any Jedi in his surgery. Mace's robes were replaced with ill-fitted garments left by another patient who didn't walk out alive, and a hood to cover his head. Together, they made their halting way back to the abandoned building where Depa and Caleb had slept last night. It was cold inside, water dripped from cracked pipes into old moss and mold, and the walls crawled with vermin, but the clones were far away from this level.

Caleb had already brought back food. Depa frowned at him. "You stole it."

"Yes."

"Don't do it again," Mace said, but he didn't turn down the meal. After Caleb had pulled himself into an unhappy ball to sleep, Depa tilted her head, leading Mace into another broken room where they could talk privately.

"You need more rest," she told him. "You're not recovered."

"Neither are you. How badly are you injured?" It was the first time they'd been alone together since Depa had left Coruscant months ago. Mace would never lack the line of strength and severity that held him upright now, but from one room to the next his voice had mellowed to a tenderness few others had ever heard.

"I'll live but I may not enjoy the experience. To tell you the truth, if we'd had more credits, I'd have taken the next bed at the surgeon's." She sat down on the foul floor, and he sat beside her. "I knew you were alive. I couldn't focus on anything else except finding you. It kept me moving."

"I felt you out there searching. It kept me breathing."

They rested against each other, listening to the irregular drip of water.

Depa said, "If you say we can fight, I will go with you, and I will fight beside you until the last." They would die. She had no doubt.

Mace was quiet. Next to her, she felt the soft heat of his body, the only warmth in this dark place. "I can't fight. I could use my left hand. I could use the Force as my weapon and my shield. We could go against the Sith and their army. It wouldn't matter. They've already won." He took a long breath. "I missed it, Depa. Like I missed the chance with Count Dooku on Geonosis. I saw the moment where all futures branched out, and I made the wrong choice."

There was no comfort to offer to that, no words she could say. She knew his gift better than anyone else. Someone who understood him less well would urge him not to blame himself. Someone who mistook shallow pity for care would say he couldn't have known. Someone who chose cool impassivity as a superstitious amulet against making their own mistakes would tell him to learn from the error for next time.

Depa said, "I'm sorry."

They fell into meditation together. It had been a long time. Before she'd been sent to Haruun Kal, before he'd been called away on another mission. They fell into their old way easily, as if months upon end had not passed between this time and the last, and this too was a form of healing. True mental connection was a gift held by very few. Instead, emotions passed between the two of them faster than thought: the boil of his sudden fear and vengeance than had cost him everything, now remembered with heavy shame; her overwhelming worry, and the inexorable press of delayed grief grinding her to the bone.

Morning, such morning as ever came to the forgotten sublevels of the city, found them together, heads resting against one another. They had found no answers to solve the overwhelming problem facing them. Nothing was left save survival.

The trick they'd used sneaking onto Coruscant wouldn't work to get them away. They scouted the spaceports, each alone and reporting back. There was little good news.

"Twelve clone troopers at this one," Mace said. "Three check every ship."

Depa considered the numbers. "Then it's the first one we looked at. Only one guard per ship."

Caleb asked, "Are we going to fight our way aboard? Won't that draw attention?"

"We aren't fighting," Depa said. "And we are not all going. Master Windu and I will provide a distraction. You will go aboard the ship."

Fear shot through her Padawan. "You're not coming?"

Mace said, "You're small and quick. Less likely to be spotted. When Master Billaba and I are well enough to travel, two together are less likely to be spotted than three."

The spaceport advertised destinations all over the galaxy. The next transport's destination flashed up on the screen. Depa said, "We will meet you there within two weeks. We will find you. I promise."

"What if you're not there in two weeks?" He posed it as a question, although she could see he already knew the answer.

"Then you must be very brave."

The distraction was risky, but simple. Depa and Mace walked by the ship arm in arm, bickering lightly like any other married couple, when Depa was taken with a vicious cramp in her belly. Mace attended to her, waving the trooper over to help. The moment he was away from his post, the ship gained another passenger.

Depa steeled herself. If he noticed Caleb and went to sound the alarm, she would kill him.

"Ma'am, I'm sorry, but you can't stay here."

"Sorry," she said, layering on a thick accent. "I don't mean to be any trouble, ah!" She clutched at her stomach.

"Help me get her to a medical station," Mace pleaded, but the trooper shoved at him.

"Move along. Both of you."

When they'd made their way far enough from him, Depa said, "He's working off a list of names, not pictures."

"I noticed. Your name is on the list. They think I'm dead."

"You're very spry for a dead man. Help me up." She hadn't been faking the pain, but allowing herself to feel it instead of pushing the ongoing ache out of mind. She really ought to see a medical droid. The look Mace gave her told her he knew that, too.

"Neither of us is spry. Are you still interested in taking on the entire Empire?"

"Perhaps tomorrow," she said, more out of breath than she'd like to be. They didn't dare risk resting up here. They made their slow way back to the lower levels, forgoing the last safe house for a shelter piled deep with vagabonds, lost souls, and now two Jedi who were both.

"I'd heard of these places," she said. "I thought the Senate promised to help the people in them find homes years ago."

"Promises stand in the place of actions. The Senate passed a resolution, felt good about themselves, and the following cycle they couldn't pass the budget measure to fund it." He accepted a cup of the thin soup being passed among the other homeless humans, made with different vitamins than similar broths ladled out for other species. He reached with both hands, where he still expected his hand to be. The charity worker passing out the food winced in pity and muttered a rote blessing over his head.

Depa drank her own soup. Her heart ached for many wounds that could never heal.

"We need a plan."

"I know."

They had to get off-world as soon as possible. The attack against the Jedi had been swift but the mastermind had not accounted for his fledgling Empire to be so chaotic. When their enemies organized themselves, they would send images of every known Jedi to their troops across the galaxy. Mace was presumed dead. Anyone else would have died from the battering he'd taken, first at the hands of the Chancellor and their treasonous former friend, and then from his fall through the city, even slowed by the Force. Depa was a wanted fugitive. Her image would soon be in the hands of every clone.

They had to make the attempt to contact other survivors. The Holonet had reported the horror at the main Temple, but surely some few had escaped in the confusion and were even now hiding in the underworld the same as the two of them. Many Jedi had been well away from here, and some would have survived. Obi-Wan had. She trusted in the Force. Others lived. They must.

"Where would you go if you were being hunted?"

"I'd stay on the move," he said. "No two nights in the same hiding place. No returning to old haunts. You're thinking we might be able to find others. You know as well as I do that if we can find them, our enemies will get there first."

She leaned back against the spot of wall they'd established as theirs for the night. "You didn't used to be such a pessimist."

"I'm not. I am trusting that the Force has a plan for us all, and I am trusting that anyone else who escaped will know not to make themselves easy to track down."

She had held out hope. She'd found Mace alive. She'd wanted to believe that together, they could find their other friends. But he was right. Anyone who could be found would already have been arrested.

"Then we will go. The galaxy is big enough for us to disappear." The words felt like defeat, even though she'd known the truth of them since she'd first awakened hidden in leaves and bleeding. "Our victory condition is survival. Nothing more."

"It's still a victory," he said, and he finished his soup.

The shelter gave everyone a musty blanket. They doubled theirs, resting together for heat as they had numerous times in the past. "Do you remember when we went to Farana?" she asked him.

"Every time I find myself in the rain and my knee aches." There was humor in the words, another precious thing few people had ever seen from him.

"That Ocsinin got lucky. I was surprised you let him live."

"That wasn't our mission."

"I know." She'd been fifteen then, still unsure about many things. Master Windu had been the one to bring her as a baby to the Temple, and he'd always taken an interest in her education. She'd never been intimidated by his intense stare when he questioned younglings during their lessons, never cringed at the boom of his voice. Even so, seeing him as one of the many Masters was a different experience from becoming both the primary object of his attention and the secondary shadow pulled along in his tremendous wake. Depa had been trained from infancy to be a Jedi, but only at his side, learning from his example, had she come to understand the full weight of what that meant. Mace could have cut down the man who'd almost killed them both, but that was not their mission, and it was not the will of the Force.

Mace rolled. The pain blockers from the surgeon had worn off, and he was restless. "I was thinking more of our mission on Birgis."

"Which one?"

"The last one."

"Ah." Right before her trials. She'd grown from wide-eyed adolescence to full adulthood, capable in the Force, gifted in certain forms of lightsaber combat, and a full partner to her Master and dearest friend. They'd camped like this then, sharing heat and thought, planning out the course of their mission together as one mind split into two bodies. "That was a good mission."

They'd gone to Seline after their work was complete, as near to the edge of the galaxy as she'd ever been before or since. The equipment at the outpost still functioned, and Mace had told her to look out past the galactic arm. Few stars were in her view from here, only smudges of distant galaxies. "There's always a horizon," he'd told her then, and she'd felt a sorrow unlike anything she'd known before or since. No matter how much they tried, no matter how fast their ships, the next galaxy was too far for anyone to reach, the Void too large to step across.

Then he'd told her to turn the viewport into the opposite direction. The Tingel Arm was sparse but that didn't matter because now she saw more stars than her mind could comprehend, spread thickly through the disk of the great galaxy that was her home, the brilliant Core and the glow of the rims shining outward with billions of stars. Millions of those stars had worlds with life, and that life teemed over every surface possible. Mace had gestured, his arm taking in all the stars. "And there is always your home."

In her darkest hours after, Depa could close her eyes and remember the night full of stars, and the very last lesson Mace had given her still as her Master. This galaxy was her home. Her responsibility was to protect it.

"We can't let them win," she said now, in the huddled darkness. "They have invaded our home."

"We let them invade. We invited them in."

"Not everyone. There was already unrest under the Republic. The same agitators who hated our democracy will not swallow tyranny any easier."

"I'd like to believe that."

"I do," she said. "More, I believe those who loved the Republic will fight to restore it. If you and I cannot win a war ourselves, we can find allies who will fight by our side." The idea warmed her.

He rolled over away from her and didn't speak.

"Mace?"

"That was the trap on Haruun Kal. Train the freedom fighters. It almost cost your life and your soul."

She took a long, shuddering breath. He was right. No wonder she'd thought of it so easily. Any road was easy to take once you'd walked it before. But there was one important difference.

"This time, I have you by my side."

"Go to sleep. We can talk about it tomorrow." Which was something he'd often said when they'd slept this way and her mind had been full of ideas. Some of the thoughts were vapors, vanished in the first sunlight. Others lingered, percolating in his mind overnight, and planting roots inside her by morning.

They were turned out from the shelter in the morning with the others, a piece of crisp bread handed to each for a breakfast as they lined up one by one to pass through the doorway. Depa was ahead of Mace, and she saw the troopers before he did, waiting with their list to check names even here among the hopeless and the poor.

"We need another exit."

"There isn't one." They met gazes. Depa pulled her lightsaber from its hiding place and kept it in her sleeve. She stepped forward, keeping pace with the line. She turned to Mace, a pleasant smile on her face. They were discussing the weather, discussing an old joke, nothing important, said the smile. "Stay behind me. Run if you can."

His own absent smile, reassuring to anyone watching, did not crack. "We leave together or not at all."

She'd expected the answer and privately cursed him regardless. Two vagrants stood in the line before her. "Sorry, I'm sorry," said the first. "I lost my identichip months ago."

One of the clone troopers grabbed him roughly by the shoulder. "Then we're taking you in."

"Please," said the charity worker. "Many of the people who stay here don't have identification. They fell through the cracks a long time ago."

"This one's going to hit the floor hard," said the clone. Depa was glad. Most of the clones she'd known had been good men, raised to duty and service the same as she'd been. If she'd been given more choice in her life when her training ended than they had, she knew that choice had as illusory and meaningless as theirs had been. She carried scars on her soul for the men she'd killed during her escape. But not all clones were kind, and not all were good. This one twisted the arm of the quivering old Gotal he dragged aside for questioning.

The next vagrant handed over her identichip to the soldiers while the worker gave her the scrap of breakfast. Then it was Depa's turn, Mace at her back.

The Force is my guide and my ally. I will trust in the Force. "I don't have my identichip. I lost it." She dropped the lightsaber handle into her hand.

"You don't need her identichip," Mace said. "You don't need any of these people's identities."

The clone's helmet turned to him. His friend raised his blaster, and Mace said, "You will drop your blaster and walk away." The second clone's blaster clattered to the ground. He turned without a word.

Depa followed his lead. She looked at the clone. "All of these people can leave."

He shook his head, then said, "All of you, out of here." The old Gotal and the others who had been detained saw their opening and fled. The line spread out around them like a wave breaking on three strong rocks in a river. A few hands reached out for the food. Most took the chance to run instead.

"You don't need to be here now," Mace said. "You've finished."

The clone said, "I don't need to be here now." He touched his helmet, and Depa tensed. "We're finished at this location." He nodded to them and walked away in the direction his colleague had gone. Mace caught the eye of the charity worker, who watched the two of them with obvious fear.

"They said you manipulate people's minds. They were right." She stepped back, away from them. "Please don't make me do something horrible!"

Depa wanted to stay and convince her they weren't evil, but Mace took her hand. They walked away from the shelter, knowing they should be long gone from this level before the troopers realized what had happened or before the workers called for reinforcements themselves.

"She thinks we're monsters," Depa whispered to him as they walked, carefully nonchalant. Never run. Running would attract attention. "It's the same that's been all over the Holonet. They are telling everyone we're traitors and dark magicians who steal infants from cradles."

He said nothing. He wasn't foolish enough to tell her that words meant nothing when they knew the truth. Words meant a great deal. Words turned potential allies into suspicious gossips who would turn in any Jedi they met. The two of them could use their powers to change one soldier's mind and avoid a fight. Their enemies would change the minds of billions, and bring the fight onto their heads.

The lower levels were only a temporary solution. Depa paused as they reached a passway, then she tugged his hand towards the upper level.

"You have a plan," he said as he matched her steps.

"A desperate one. We can't board a ship. We need to take one." The spaceports were too well-guarded. Thousands of private ships came and went every day from the city above. A stolen one would attract attention, but they were running out of options.

She said none of this. Mace considered it, following the train of her thoughts easily. "A politician's ship will be well-tracked for their security. A merchant's ship will be guarded for the credits." But there were far more ships that visited Coruscant. The idle rich and the thieving, assuming one could tell the difference, brought vessels here every day.

Getting close was a different problem. They wore old garments for their disguise, not much finer than those worn by the beggars they'd shared sleeping space with last night. A Jedi's simple robes had been equally welcome in any place. With those now they'd be marked for extermination, but without, they were subject to the same suspicion any other poor people walking the upper levels would be. They scouted several likely-looking apartment spires, each time moving along before they were asked their business here.

"This one," Depa said. The building was rumored to attract more of the somewhat more upscale criminals, not petty smugglers or drug runners but the people who kept their hands clean while employing the latter. They wouldn't be out of place in their borrowed clothes. All they needed was a name to call on.

"Mr. Dargon is expecting us," Mace said, and it was enough to charm the five-armed doorman. They took the lift to a middle floor, where they'd seen several ships docked. From the ground, several had looked expensive, while others had looked expedient.

The ships were guarded. Depa said, "Mr. Dargon sent us." She was greeted with three blasters.

She lit her lightsaber, a dull joy filling her as she sliced the blasters into pieces in the guards' hands. It would be so easy to let the pleasure of battle take her now. She could not strike at the enemies who'd destroyed her home and killed her friends, and she'd been prevented from attacking the clone troopers earlier. These were criminals, working for other criminals. Depa would be doing the galaxy a blessing by cutting them down. As one ran at her, he was suddenly shoved into a wall by a power from beside her. The other two looked at their chances, and fled, one smacking an alarm on his way through the door.

Mace gestured at one of the ships, a beaten up light freighter. Depa paused, closing her blade and clipping it to her belt. Then she saw what he had already noted: the engine parts peeking out the back were brand new. Mace threw the guard in his power roughly to the floor as they boarded the ship.

Many Jedi knew the basics of piloting, and Depa was no exception. The engines purred to life, a low noise promising a fast getaway. More guards came back through the door with fresh blasters, but she had already taken off. Blasts hit the hull, adding to the array of dents and blasts that hid the ship's true nature. Mace opened the navicomputer, running a calculation awkwardly with his left hand as Depa made her way up through the city.

He said casually, "This ship belongs to Pelto Varsol. We'd have been better off with Dargon."

"The smuggler?" She swerved to avoid a spire, then found her opening in the sky. "Let him argue with the Empire about who gets the pleasure of taking our heads."

The atmosphere around them thinned, and within minutes, she'd reached space. Mace set his calculations and hit the hyperdrive. They soared into hyperspace, leaving Coruscant behind. They would not arrive at their destination for another day, two if she redirected to stagger the route and avoid pursuit.

"Check for trackers," he told her, examining the controls. "Varsol will want his ship back."

She stood from the chair and searched the cockpit. When she went into the cargo area, she stopped cold. "Mace?"

He joined her, taking in the crates. Even sealed, the scent of spice lingered in the air. He opened the closest crate to confirm their suspicion, then closed it with a tight snap. "Given the number of crates, I would say if we sold it, we'd have enough credits to retire comfortably."

Depa stared at him in shock. "We need to dump this poison as soon as we can."

"Do we?"

"Yes!"

"Good," he said. "Help me move these." Depa stacked them at the airlock, noticing the wince on his face as he rested his arm while he watched her. "We can drop them when we come out of hyperspace."

When they'd returned to the cockpit, Depa sat in the pilot's chair. "Sell them? What kind of joke is that?"

He didn't answer her. He stared out at the blue swirling around them, a glimpse of an in-between space where anything was possible.

"Mace?"

"If I hadn't stopped you, you'd have killed those guards. You'd have killed the clones at the shelter as well. I wasn't sure if you'd also be up for drug running while you were at it."

She sat back in shock, an unfamiliar anger tempting her. "I was ready to defend our lives. We are wanted fugitives, unless that has escaped your notice."

"I'm noticing much. How many people did you kill on your way back to Coruscant?" He was upset with her, leaning towards anger. They were both on edge. She felt the turbulence in her mind, and the bite in her mouth. They never sniped at one another, but hot words were easy on her tongue.

"I came back to rescue you. After we escaped the clones trying to kill us, I haven't harmed a soul in that effort." She read a wary disbelief in his face. "You still don't trust me. It has been almost a year since Haruun Kal, Mace. I didn't fall to the Dark Side then, and I will not sit by while you insinuate it now."

"You have demonstrated a disappointing lack of control."

It occurred to her that they were together in a small ship, both recovering from wounds that could have killed each. He was the more grievously injured, and she was almost his equal in combat when he was well, an eyelash of difference between them. If this descended, if they fought, there was no obvious winner, and the odds were good than the victor would earn the right to bleed out before the ship reached its destination.

She turned from him, checking the navicomp readout. She changed the course and felt the engines shudder as they shifted.

He leaned over to see the new course, concerned. "What's the new heading?"

"The closest system I could find." Within moments, they came out of hyperspace. They wouldn't have long. This was still the Core and they were now wanted by the law and the lawless. Depa hurried to the cargo bay, then shoved the crates into the airlock before sealing and evacuating it.

Mace came up behind her. Her instincts told her to defend. Her mind told her otherwise.

"You didn't have to do that to impress me."

"I didn't," she said sharply. "We've been exposed to the spice dust. It's getting to us."

"I find that hard to believe." He went to fold his arms, and a flash of pain and loss came over him. The part of her that was affected by the residue all over this smuggling vessel wanted to hit him, fight him, hurt him for doubting her still. Intoxication didn't create thoughts, only dragged them to the forefront without the filter most people lived with every day.

She tried to think. "You have known me since I was a child. You treated me like a daughter. You raised me to be your equal. You have been part of my life for as long as I can remember. When have you ever called me 'disappointing' before?"

"I said...." Mace touched his head. He shook it. "What I meant to say...."

"Don't say what you meant. Don't say anything. Think."

He closed his eyes, shutting his mouth, stopping his breath for longer than most humans would think possible without gasping in. Then he opened them and looked at her. "The spice."

"Yes."

"We need to make port and get rid of the ship."

"Agreed. But we can't do that for a while. If we are anywhere closer than the Mid-Rim, we'll be caught before the day is out." She walked back to the cockpit again, aware of the scent of the drug clinging to her clothes. The crates had not been well-sealed. If they aired out the hold on some world, and thoroughly washed everything, they might get rid of the residue.

She reset their course and engaged the hyperdrive. Mace didn't follow her this time. It took her a while to notice, her gaze caught by the blue cascade around her.

She'd partaken in intoxicants before. As part of her study of the ways of the Chalactan truths, she had undertaken the same rituals as the sages. The spice they used was refined ryll, strictly controlled and legislated for religious use. She remembered her being opening to the cosmos, remembered experiencing the Force as a living thing inside her, twisting and churning her. The Korunnai she'd worked with briefly, the younger ones, sometimes dabbled in spice, and she had been slipped some in her tea during her first night, part as a prank, part as a challenge to this Jedi interloper. It had given her a splitting headache, nothing more. Now that she had her darker emotions in control, knowing their source, she could spend the rest of this occasion watching the pretty colors swirl.

After an hour, possibly two, she realized Mace wasn't with her, and hadn't been. She stood, a touch dizzy, and went aft. The freighter boasted two crew cabins, although it was an empty boast. The first room was large enough to hold two bunks, one atop the other, storage beneath the bottom one, too narrow to stand with the door closed. It was a place to sleep, nothing more. She found Mace resting in the other cabin. This had only one double-sized bunk or perhaps two set side by side, with a precious half-meter of floor space to spare.

"You took the better room, I see," she said, and felt the words come out sharper than she'd hoped.

One eye opened. "There's space." He adjusted his sprawl, leaving a spot towards the edge. Depa sat, and finding the cushion more comfortable than it looked, she let herself relax, laying her head beside his.

"I do trust you," he said, when she'd almost drifted off. "And I worry about you."

"I know."

"These are dark times. We are going to face hard choices. I'm not confident I trust myself to make the right ones. My head is swimming, so I concern myself with the chance of your drowning."

"Your head is swimming from the spice. So is mine. This room seems to be free of the smell at least." Except what she'd brought in on her clothes, and what clung to his, and that had to be the reason, the only reason, why Depa nudged her face towards him and kissed him. It was equally the reason he did not pull away from her instantly, instead returning the kiss with a sweet pain at odds with the intensity she would have expected.

It was the spice, and the lingering sorrow and terror and the whole heady boil of emotions they had never been taught to experience, only to master. Their friends were gone, the extended family that had raised them now shattered beyond repair. Comfort was a sacred thing in evil times.

She could not read his mind but she could feel the direction of his emotions, spiraling in from near-despair to a warmth centered on her. She knew he could read the depths of her affection for him, knew he understood how he had always been her pillar of strength, even during the times she'd been the one carrying him from the field of battle. They were one another's touchstone, the one beacon in all the galaxy where each would hear the call, and would come.

The Order forbade this. Some Jedi took the occasional simple pleasure in one another, and this was understood as a physical need, nothing more. The ban against that close contact between masters and their Padawans, even former Padawans long ascended to adulthood, was strictly enforced. The potential for harm was too great, said reason. The surrogate parent-child relationship was too imbalanced even in adulthood, warned the taboo. The attachment was far too strong, said the rule, and the Order held firm.

The Order was gone now. If Mace had once acted as a father to her, he had long since become her closest friend. Tonight he took on one more role. Two virgins too old for shyness, they found their way past the borrowed clothes down to skin, learning each other, mindful of the still fresh wounds. Depa's hair came loose from her neat coil. Mace took a dark strand in his left hand, stroking as though treasuring a fine lace he'd never dared touch before. Her former master, who had always remained in control of his every move, who had never made one awkward motion as long as they'd known each other, entered her clumsily. Depa cried out with a pain she hadn't expected, her hands moving to hold his chest, hold him still until her body relaxed, allowing him deeper. Want burned inside her as he filled her completely, a soft breath against her ear the only noise he made.

They moved together, twisting and resettling until finally she pushed him down to the bunk and crouched astride him. This was the angle she needed, and she took the pleasure she found there, the dizzy rapture of the spice in her veins urging her on, rising and falling over him like the swell of the sea. In their other life, they'd have grown old side by side and never once felt the lack of physical closeness. In another life altogether, they'd have been married for years. In the life they lived now, this was far too late for their first time, and this was the one perfect moment. She could blame the spice, and he would blame that alongside blaming himself, but the spice only allowed what was already inside them to burst free on their tongues. When she cried out again, it was in pure bliss.

After, she rested beside him as she had rested beside him on so many other nights, but this time they woke from shallow sleep in small fits to turn and kiss again before drifting off. Hours later, she went out to the cockpit to check their course. She added two more jumps to keep from being followed. Satisfied, she came back, and woke him with more kisses. This time, she didn't let him go back to sleep for a long time.

He woke for real hours later, and lay beside her, eyes closed, mind revolving. The air filters on the ship had cleaned some of the contamination from the atmosphere. Complex calculations would be beyond either of them right now, but basic thought was easier. He was thinking, and she couldn't read his thought, only feel his sorrowful turmoil.

Depa stroked his neck. "Are you all right?"

"I should ask you. I'm sorry." Mace's eyes opened. He stared at the ceiling.

"For what? Getting drugged by the air around us?"

"I should have realized what was happening. I should have kept control. I hurt you. I have never once wanted to hurt you. It's my job to take care of you."

She lay her head next to his. She was sore, yes, but not terribly so. "It was when I was younger. That hasn't been your job in years. Now we take care of each other." She watched his face. They knew each other's moods as well as their own. Storms moved through his eyes. Her heart fell. "If you are angry and upset that I took advantage of you, then I offer my deepest apology and I swear it will not happen again."

He frowned. "Took advantage of _me_?"

"I propositioned you while you were compromised."

"I recall things differently," he said. "You were affected by the spice, and I didn't stop myself from crossing the line." He closed his eyes again. "I swore to myself years ago that I would never act inappropriately with you, and I never did until last night. The fault is mine."

She picked through his words carefully, examining them. The process unwrapped truths part of her had always wondered at and dismissed as her own childishness. "You wanted this before." 

"It's not something a Jedi should ever want." Which was not a denial. He'd never spoken a lie to her, and only now did a lie of omission come forth. Her calm, collected, dispassionate master, the model to which she'd always strived, had spent not one single moment of their time together indicating that he desired her.

"You know that's not true. We have numerous friends who have sex." Had. The galaxy had changed. For a few sweet, stolen moments, she'd let herself forget.

"That's different. I was your master."

"And now you aren't. You're my friend. If I was going to lose myself in a spice haze, I'm glad I was with you." She rested her head against his shoulder. "You wanted me. You never said, and I agree with your reasons, but Mace, I wanted you, too."

He had always been her ideal, first the distant, perfect Jedi Master, then the stern yet caring teacher, and finally the one true peer she'd ever known. No one could hope to compare. If she'd imprinted her youthful desires on him, knowing even then the confusing emotions could never be requited, who remained to chide her now? She was no child. She may have set aside the wistful fantasy, but she hadn't stopped wanting him.

She said, "We don't have to talk about what happened if that's what you choose. We're still being exposed to the spice, but I can go to the other room. This doesn't have to happen again, not if it hurts you this much."

He turned to face her. "You are being ridiculously reasonable about this."

"I had a good example to follow."

"I'd hoped you did. I'm no longer sure about that. Intellectually, I think your plan of going elsewhere right now is for the best."

Depa smiled. "I have always admired your intellect. What do you think would happen if I stayed here?"

"I'd spend the rest of our journey fighting the urge to roll you over and practice until we managed to get things right."

"That could take hours," she said. "It's safe to say we're both versed on the theory, but I agree, we need far more practice." She made no move to leave. She did move her hand to touch his cheek. "I'm not one to shirk from practice, as you know."

"I know."

She kissed him, and he kissed her in return. She stayed. They practiced together. They got it right.

Two days of quick jumps got them to a safe dock planetside. They couldn't linger, not in a stolen ship. They spent enough time to air out the hold and clean their clothes. In another compartment, they found the owner's stash of credits. These bought food and fuel, enough to get them to the planet where Depa had sent Caleb.

"He's either terrified, or he's already swindled half the city out of their life's savings," Mace said as they set their course.

"Neither. He's inquisitive and he's resourceful, and before you say another word, remember how we acquired this ship."

Mace sat in thought. "We need to find some means to feed ourselves that isn't illegal."

"We'll think of something." They were hardly farmers or miners. The Outer Rim hosted many colonies well away from the hum of galactic politics. They needed teachers. Once they had a place, they could find means to contact their few potential allies who still lived in public. The Jedi had good friends in a few of the Senators. One or two might still be friendly. They would need caution, and they'd need new identities. So much lay before her to plan now that she could think clearly. But first, she had to collect her Padawan.

She worried that finding him would be difficult. Planets were large, and a boy wanted by the Empire shouldn't make himself too easy for anyone to find. He wasn't among the list of arrested or executed Jedi that the Empire sent daily over the Holonet. She took hope from that.

They docked the ship at the spaceport where his transport would have taken him. "I don't have any images of him," Depa said as they exited out into the grimy city around the spaceport. "He could be anywhere."

Mace looked at the building in front of them. Among the graffiti splattered across the wall in a dozen languages was painted: _for a good time see Jocasta, 4th street_. For a moment, they both shared a mental image of the Temple librarian out of her robes.

Depa said, "You don't think...."

"Of all the possible Padawans you could have chosen, you picked him?"

A few questions got them directions to the fourth street of the city, which turned out to be an underlevel much as Coruscant had, attracting the homeless, the destitute, and the wanderers. Blanket tents stretched in doorways, or covered repurposed crates. Caleb sat atop one of the latter, springing from his seat as soon as he saw them.

"You're okay!" he shouted, flinging himself into Depa's surprised arms. A second later he froze and backed away. "Sorry, Master."

"It's fine," she said with a relieved smile.

Mace said, "You seem to be doing well, Jocasta."

"That worked! I thought maybe you'd see it and think about the librarian, and you'd know it was from me."

Depa said, "You're lucky no one else who knew what you meant saw it first." Caleb's face fell. "But it was a clever idea. We're going to need all the clever ideas we can come up with going forward. Are you ready to travel?"

"Yes. Where are we going?" He ducked his head into the crate. Depa thought she saw him grabbing a familiar cylinder, stuffing it into his pocket.

Mace said in a low voice, "You left your lightsaber in a crate?"

Caleb replied in a whisper, looking around nervously, "I didn't want anybody to see it."

"Never leave your weapon behind. It is a symbol and a reminder of who you are, and it may make the difference between your survival and your doom."

Depa recognized this lecture. She'd gotten the same one thirty years ago. She wouldn't tease him for that now, not with Mace's own lightsaber lost. "This way. We have a ship. This would be a good place to sell it and purchase a new one."

"Where'd we get a ship?" Neither of them answered as Caleb looked between them while they walked. "Did you steal it?" Depa didn't want to answer that, either. "You said no more stealing. You said that was a bad life lesson."

Mace said, "Is he going to talk the entire way?"

There weren't many ships available for sale or trade. They didn't need a large one, Mace said to the salescreature, just a reliable shuttlecraft to carry him, his wife, and their son out to Klatooine. "My brother swears there are jobs for the taking. He and his husband have a huge house where we can stay. We just need to get there." His smile was wide and friendly, so opposite to his normal serious personality that Caleb's jaw dropped open watching him.

The one they settled on was smaller and older than the one they were selling, but had the advantage of not belonging to a drug smuggler. For a very small fee, the salescreature deleted its records of the transaction. They weren't untraceable, even with her strong suggestion to the creature that it forget it ever saw them. But they were safer than they had been for a long time.

"I want this room," Caleb said, as soon as he opened one of the cabins. He turned. "May I, Master? I mean," he stopped. "Do I have to call you 'Mom' now?"

"I'd rather you didn't, and I'm sure Master Windu would be exceptionally cross if you ever called him 'Dad' except in the direst of straits. We'll need new names, and we will call one another by those. And yes, you can have that room."

"Thanks!" He went in and climbed up to the top bunk. Depa closed the door. The other cabin was across from the first. The captain's room again, with one bunk instead of two. Mace stepped up behind her, seeing the same thing.

"I'll take the second bunk in Caleb's room," he said.

"Why?"

"You know why."

They watched each other. Depa said, "We are walking a dark path no one else has traveled, and the only way I know to get through is to travel it together."

"It's a bad example for the boy." His response surprised her. No more hiding behind the decrees of the Council. No more placing their first relationship to block the way of this new one. He wasn't even making a pretense that this wasn't what he wanted, perhaps because she'd know he was lying, and he didn't lie to her.

"Perhaps it is a new example worth demonstrating." She went into the cabin, and looked at him, waiting.

Mace followed her into the room, and closed the door behind him.


End file.
